1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is directed to a method for controlling a printer, particularly a high-performance printer, having a plurality of input locations for carrier material, whereby the print information are offered in a standard page description language. The invention is also directed to a printer wherein the method is realized.
2. Description of the Related Art
In what is referred to as xe2x80x9cremote modexe2x80x9d, a printer is supplied with print information according to a standard page description language from a higher-ranking control. Such a page description language describes the content and appearance of all elements of a page to be printed, for example the text, vector graphics, images, etc., on the basis of hardware-independent instructions. The device control generally contains an interpreter for this standard page description language and converts the supplied printing information into the corresponding hardware signals with which, for example, the character generator for producing the picture elements is driven in a laser printer. Known page description languages are PostScipt, PCL (printer command language), particularly version PCL5, or IPDS(Intelligent Printer Data Steam).
The standard page description languages define a single input location from a plurality of possible input locations for the carrier material by specifying a destination address, which is then accessed supported by the device control. The result thereof is that the paper supply in the indicated input compartment is consumed after a specific time. The device control then stops the printing process and an operator resupplies new carrier material. What is disadvantageous in the known method is that larger printing jobs cannot be implemented without interruption and the time intervals for required replenishment of carrier material are relatively short.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,763,889 A discloses a printer with a plurality of input compartments that are driven by a central control as needed. The control thereby determines whether paper is still present in a first input compartment and switches to another input compartment when the first compartment is empty. What is disadvantageous about this printer is that the total number of input compartments is limited to a low number. As a result thereof, both the multiplicity of different recording material (paper, film, formats) to be processed as well as the total number of pages available for the respective grades of recording material, are limited.
An object of the invention is to specify a printing system and a method for the control thereof wherein an interruption-free printing operation is possible for a relatively long time.
This object is achieved by a method for controlling a printer, particularly a high-performance printer, having a plurality of input stations that each respectively comprise a plurality of input locations. The carrier material to be printed is thereby supplied from one of the input locations and the print information are offered in a standard page description language, from which a device control of the printer determines the information before printing, whereby the page description language indicates the single input location with a destination address. The device control assigns at least two input locations to a common logical device address and also assigns the logical device address to the destination address. Given occurrence of a predetermined operating condition of one of the input locations under the logical device address, a switch is made to the other input location and the carrier material is then supplied from the other input location 1.
What the invention achieves in the remote mode operating condition is that at least two input locations, i.e. two input compartmentsxe2x80x94a plurality of input compartments can also be provided given larger print jobsxe2x80x94accept carrier material in order to be able to implement the printing operation interruption free, even when one input compartment is empty or fails due to a malfunction. The device control employs the destination address defined by the page description language and assigns a logical device address to this destination address, the input compartments being capable of being accessed at the destination address. As a result, thus, a plurality of input compartments are successively emptied in remote mode without the data having to be modified on the part of the page description language. On the contrary, the intervention ensues on the part of the device control of the printer, whereby the required measures are simple due to allocation of logical addresses. The respectively empty or malfunctioning input compartment can be refilled by an operator or automatically, so that an interruption-free printing operation is achieved for an arbitrarily long time.
With the invention, in particular, a plurality of input stations can be linked with one another cascade-like. Input locations or, respectively, compartments of different input stations can thereby be assigned to a common device address. When the input compartment of an input station is empty, a switch is automatically made to another input compartment, particularly to an input compartment of another input station. Recording material that is taken from an input station lying farther away from the printer in the cascade structure is then looped through corresponding channels in the preceding input stations to the printer. The control of the execution sequence can ensue with a central device control or by individual controls allocated to the individual input stations. These controls can be connected to one another in a the master-slave arrangement, whereby, for example, the input station lying closest to the printer forms the master.
The invention is also directed to a printer having an input arrangement including a plurality of input locations, whereby the carrier material to be printed is supplied from one of a plurality of input stations that each respectively comprise a plurality of input locations from which carrier material to be printed is supplied, the print information is present in a standard page description language from which a device controller of the printer determines the information for printing, the page description language indicating a destination address, wherein the device controller allocates a common logical device address to at least two input locations, the device controller allocates the logical device address to the destination address, and given occurrence of a predetermined operating condition of one of the input locations under the logical device address, the controller switches to another input location of the same logical device address and carrier material is then supplied from said another input location. This printer realizes the above method, and also achieves the aforementioned, advantageous effects.